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Newton's "Principia" stolen
Silverleaf writes "O2 have a story on the theft of Isaac Newton's revolutionary "Philosophiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica" from a Russian museum. For the non-physicists among you, Newton first published his famed three laws of motion and his law of universal gravitation in "Principia" in 1687. I'm surprised this theft hasn't attracted more attention in the mainstream media, since "Principia" is generally considered the most important scientific works in history."
Those of you hopping up and down about this should calm down. This is not a big story.
This copy of the Principia was one of the first edition copies. First editions are crap. They have all the errors and misspellings, and they come out with nicer editions afterward that make you feel stupid for not waiting a little longer. Just look at all those first edition "Lord of the Rings" DVDs that are now for sale on Ebay. Newton probably filled his "Principia Director's Cut" with at least 30 pages of extra stuff for those Renaissance astronomers who were willing to wait and pay a little extra for the famous "apple scene".
Second, you have to remember that the book really isn't that good. While Newton was trying to describe concepts such as planetary motion and orbital dynamics that usually involve calculus, the only branch of mathematics well known at the time was Euclidean geometry. So the Principia is dumbed down to the level of his contemporary boneheads- and it suffers greatly for it. For example, here is a section cut and pasted from the Principia (the author has been dead since 1727 so this is probably still safe):
PROPOSITION XI. PROBLEM VI.
If a body revolves in an ellipsis; it is required to find the law of the centripetal force tending to the focus of the ellipsis.
Let S be the focus of the ellipsis. Draw SP cutting the diameter DK of the ellipsis in E, and the ordinate Qv in x; and complete the parallelogram QxPR. It is evident that EP is equal to the greater semi-axis AC: for drawing HI from the other focus H of the ellipsis parallel to EC, because CS, CH are equal, ES, EI will be also equal; so that EP is the half sum of PS, PI, that is (because of the parallels HI, PR, and the equal angles IPR, HPZ), of PS, PH, which taken together, are equal to the whole axis 2AC. Draw QT perpendicular to SP, and putting L for the principal latus rectum of the ellipsis (or for 2BC^2/AC), we shall have L QR to L Pv as QR to Pv, that is, as PE or AC to PC; and L Pv to GvP as L to Gv; and GvP to Qv^2 as PC^2 to CD^2; and by (Corol. 2, Lem. VII) the points Q and P coinciding, Qv^2 is to Qx^2 in the ratio of equality; and Qx^2 or Qv^2 is to QT^2 as EP^2 to PF^2, that is, as CA^2 to PF^2, or (by Lem. XII) as CD^2 to CB^2. And compounding all those ratios together, we shall have LQR to QT^2 as ACLPC^2CD^2, or 2CB^2PC^2CD^2 to PCGvCD^2CB^2, or as, 2PC to Gv. But the points Q and P coinciding, 2PC and Gr are equal. And therefore the quantities LQR and QT^2, proportional to these, will be also equal. Let those equals be drawn into SP2/QR, and LSP^2 will become equal to SP^2 QT^2 / QR. And therefore (by Corol. 1 and 5, Prop. VI) the centripetal force is reciprocally as LSP2, that is, reciprocally in the duplicate ratio of the distance SP. Q.E.D.
Holy crap! And you should see the pictures! Can you imagine it in Latin, too! Whoever stole this book is going to be sorry. You'd have to be a crazy person to want to steal this book, or to bid on it if it shows up on Ebay. I think we can assume that the remaining copies of this first edition Principia aren't going to walk anytime soon.
Explaining concepts for a wide audience using insufficiently advanced math is a very difficult trick to pull off. Feynman did a reasonably good job of it in QED. But seriously, would you rather read a book by Feynman or Newton? Feynman also wrote books that told you how to pick up bar chicks. Newton wrote his books in Latin and died a virgin. Before Feynman died he made history by breaking a piece of rubber on national TV. Newton's career, on the other hand, ended at the mint where he spent the rest of his life hanging counterfeiters. Both of these guys were really smart. But which one do you think did a better job at writing books for people with a limited attention span?
Third, the theories are wrong. They look good at first, and seem to explain most phenomena very well. But if you kick the tires and look at more accurate measurements, you start noticing things don't quite match up right. The perihelion of Mercury precesses, when Newton claims it shouldn't. And while F = GMm/r^2 gives good numbers for everyday work such as hurling probes at high speed into Mars, it's wrong. The equation is just wrong; it gives wrong answers! They're usually close but they're always wrong. The very first equation they teach you in high school physics is another one that Newton came up with, F=ma, and F=ma is wrong too! F starts to get bigger faster than a at high speeds! They have F=dp/dt, and that equation works with relativity, so why don't they indoctrinate kids' heads with that one? Probably because it uses Leibniz notation, and Newton hated Leibniz. And high school physics even today is under the thrall of Newton.